


Dream a little dream of me

by wawalux



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Confessions, Dancing, Daredevil (TV) Spoilers, Daredevil Karen Page, Drama, Drama & Romance, Drunk Dancing, Drunken Confessions, Drunken Flirting, Drunken Kissing, Drunken Shenanigans, Drunkenness, F/M, Falling In Love, First Kiss, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friendship/Love, Gentle Kissing, Hope, Idiots in Love, Karen Page Knows Matt is Daredevil, Kissing, Love, Love Confessions, Magic Fingers, Matt Murdock Needs a Hug, Romance, Romantic Fluff, Season 3 Finale, Secret Crush, Secrets, Slow Burn, Slow Dancing, Surprise Kissing, Talking, True Love's Kiss, Walking
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-29
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:20:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25588966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wawalux/pseuds/wawalux
Summary: “So what’s it going to be, Miss Page?” he asked when he managed to still. He was using his ‘Matt with Foggy and Karen’ voice and I was grateful because any other tone would have only proceeded to melt my legs further and right now I really needed to stand.I thought about getting another cab, about going to bed, about the right thing to do, and then I thought about this feeling, and this day and just how fucking short life was, and that maybe these moments were not meant to be lost to sleep. By the time I was done thinking, the world was spinning faster than my thoughts and standing still had stopped being an option.“Walk me home?” I asked, and the two Matt’s in front of me smiled my favourite lopsided smile.
Relationships: Matt Murdock & Karen Page, Matt Murdock/Franklin "Foggy" Nelson/Karen Page, Matt Murdock/Karen Page
Comments: 15
Kudos: 19





	1. To our own beats - Karen

**Author's Note:**

> Stars fading, but I linger on, dear  
> Still craving your kiss  
> I'm longing to linger till dawn, dear  
> Just saying this
> 
> The song is called 'Dream a little dream of me' in case you need some background to go with your reading!

We stayed until the food was mostly-eaten and the leftovers were scattered on trays like bodies in a battle-field. We stayed past the time where half-drunk parents decided to drag the squealing over-tired children home, and even Mr and Mrs Nelson had shut shop for the night. We stayed, just the three of us, like we needed to immortalise that napkin by carving it into one night.

And only when the last drop of beer had been drunk and Matt had wasted the last of the whisky by slamming his glass down onto the table as a final toast to Father Lantom, only then did we decide to call it a night and rose unsteadily to our feet, tipping heavily into each other’s arms like leaning towers of Pisa.

I surveyed the mess of glasses and plates and food scraps and footprints around us and knew, deep down, that Father Lantom would’ve been proud. And even prouder still of Matt, who was swaying slightly on his feet like a ship in a storm, and who was becoming steadily more fuzzy around the edges in a way that somehow made him so attractive that I almost drooled. Perhaps it was time to head home.

“Foggy, no!” I screamed when he snatched Matt’s cane and proceeded to start sparring the nearest lamp post, complete with authentic pirate cries of: ‘To battle yer scurvy dog!’ until Matt had to grab him by his coat to stop him from falling on his face on the pavement.

“We need to get him home,” I told Matt and he started nodding like a bobo-head. I had to stop his face with my palm when the movement made me dizzy. He froze, letting go of Foggy’s coat, who decided to make a run for it in a bid for freedom, except the ground wasn’t steady enough for his legs, so he ended up hugging the lamp post like a koala.

“Ok. Time for a cab Mr Nelson,” I told him while he slurred something about Nelson, Murdock and Page painting the town red and the power of the eel.

I flagged down the nearest cab with a wave and proceeded to help Matt extricate Foggy from the pole, while he muttered about proposing to Marcie in a pirate musical that Nelson, Murdock and Page could star in, and how it had to be tonight. We finally unhooked the last of his many tentacles and managed to shove him in the car amidst a flurry of ‘I love you guys so much’ and ‘We’ll see you tomorrow, Foggy, get some rest’ and a hefty tip to the driver who was eyeing Foggy speculatively in the ‘if he spews in my cab’ way that could only be shut up with money.

And then we were alone, on the edge of the pavement, panting from the effort of fighting a drunk Foggy into a cab and fluctuating gently while the world spun too fast on its axis. Matt had his cane back in his hand but was karate chopping the air in an effort to right himself. I watched that hand move and tried not to remember how it felt cradled against my face. A weight settled itself in my gut and made me so heavy I was surprised I was able to stand.

“So what’s it going to be, Miss Page?” he asked when he managed to still. He was using his ‘Matt with Foggy and Karen’ voice and I was grateful because any other tone would have only proceeded to melt my legs further and right now _I really needed to stand_.

I thought about getting another cab, about going to bed, about the right thing to do, and then I thought about this feeling, and this day and just how fucking short life was, and that maybe these moments were not meant to be lost to sleep. By the time I was done thinking, the world was spinning faster than my thoughts and standing still stopped being an option.

“Walk me home?” I asked and the two Matt’s in front of me smiled my favourite lopsided smile.

We took to the streets like children, walking as steadily as bumper cars, sometimes hitting walls, sometimes each other, sometimes ending up on the road and looping in on ourselves. We collapsed in a fit of giggles near the mouth of a dark alley, doubled-down and with tears streaming down our faces. We hadn't even made it a whole block.

"Can you hear that?" Matt stopped laughing and raised his head like a dog to attention.

"Hear what?" I asked, and even amongst the spinning I couldn’t help but turn around expecting danger.

Matt smiled faintly and placed his arms on either side of my hips. The warmth of his palms seeped through the thin fabric of my dress and heated more than just my skin.

"What are you doing?" I huffed out. Things were suddenly not so funny anymore.

"Turning up the volume," he whispered tantalizingly close to my ear before lifting me high in the air. I stifled a scream and grabbed onto the rung of the fire escape that had materialized in front of me. He didn't let go until I was safely on the first floor, heart in my throat, watching him run and bounce off the wall before joining me in a leap that was as graceful as a doe's and even more impressive considering how drunk he was.

"Shall we?" he asked, breath heavy, a black shadow in the dark. I took off my heels and led the way with as much dignity as I could muster. I knew that he would catch me if I fell. It worried me how much that made me want to fall. The imprints of his palms still glowed faintly on my skin, like they were startled by the brush of cold after the promise of his hands. Matt followed me closely, occasionally placing a hand on my back, or my hip, or my arm to steady me or to steady himself, starting small fires with each touch until I worried that I was glowing like a Christmas tree in his periphery.

The climb felt easier in the night, height an illusion well hidden by nightfall, alcohol numbing the burn in my muscles. The fresh air helped clear the dizziness from the drink. We reached the rooftop in silence, but the lack of air in my lungs had nothing to do with the exertion. And then the view took the rest of my breath away.

Smooth jazz floated our way light as a ribbon in the gentle breeze. I recognized the melody of 'Dream a little dream of me' travelling from an open window somewhere below us. It felt like being in a 1920s movie, the city laid bare in black and white. Darkness erased the world and left us glittering between the urban lights and the stars. I wanted to describe it to him, just how wonderful it felt to float in a galaxy of our own, but I couldn't find the words.

"May I have this dance?" I turned to find Matt extending his right hand in a half bow. He had removed his tie at some point and his shirt collar was half unbuttoned and opened as invitingly as an envelope with half spilled contents. I stared at the faint bounce of his pulse by his neck like a forbidden secret.

"I didn't know you danced," I told him as he took my hand, trying to hide just how much I was in awe. It was unfair to look this good, this tempting, swaying in the dark.

"Please don't tell Foggy," he grinned, and the world lit up like a house on fire. I could only look and hope that my eyes would do this memory justice.

Taking his hand felt right and wrong and like the only thing I could do in this most perfect slice of life. He took my other hand and placed it gently on his shoulder. I tried hard not to squeeze it, pretending I didn’t know what hid underneath. Then he slowly moved his right hand to my back, tracing from my chest to just above my hip with tendrils of fire and stopped in the small of my back like a true gentleman that belonged somewhere fancier than on a rooftop. We started to sway like teenagers in the shadows, and somehow the movement righted the world that had been spinning the wrong way since we'd left Foggy. Dancing belonged to this night, like the music and the dark, and we moved more gently than planets among the stars.

He made me twirl once, causing the lights to swirl like snowflakes in a blizzard, before he started humming softly, almost tunelessly, so low that I could barely catch the words dancing off his lips over the sound of the music.

_"Stars shining bright above you_

_Night breezes seem to whisper "I love you"_

_Birds singing in the sycamore tree_

_Dream a little dream of me"_

He made me twirl again and this time I closed my eyes, letting gravity turn into the feel of his strong warm fingers waiting to catch me. I landed closer to his chest like it was an accident. His hand pressed against my back lightly, like he was giving me the option to step away. I never did.

"You are not going to kiss me, Matt," I warned him. Maybe I was trying to tell his lips that I could see glisten faintly in the dark, as promising as a horizon before the dawn. Maybe I was just trying to remind myself that there would be principles and consequences when we landed from the sky.

"I wouldn't dream of it, Miss Page" he reassured me, and I couldn’t help but be disappointed. Of course now that Matt knew me, the whole me, he wouldn’t want this anymore.

But then he added: "Well, maybe _dream_ isn't the correct word," with a cocky grin that was so Matt, the before Matt, that it made my heart hurt. A flood of warmth washed the disappointment away and reached my nerves as I blushed. He tested the heat with a gentle stroke of my cheek with the back of his hand, his face breaking into a tender smile, and then he resumed his humming:

_"Sweet dreams till sunbeams find you_

_Sweet dreams that leave all worries behind you_

_But in your dreams whatever they be_

_Dream a little dream of me"_

He said the last bit like a prayer, and I tried, I really tried not to let my heart speak for me. But it fluttered at the implications of his words and Matt stole each beat like a secret.

He quieted then and let the music take care of leading the dance. His thumb brushed my hand as soft as a melody, just the once, like he'd forgotten that we weren't there anymore. It was easy to forget our lives tonight. After all, none of this belonged in the real world.

We swayed gently on the spot until the music died quieter than a last breath and the only sound became the feel of his hand in mine. I spied his face among the shadows, half-hidden behind the glasses: Matt looked at peace with the world, settled. The look of his face made me wish for rain and little lights shaped like chili peppers dripping from the ceiling.

"The music is gone, Matt," I murmured eventually, but didn't let go.

He made me spin one more time, a leaf in the autumn wind, and caught my hand before I could leave it back on his shoulder. He placed my fingers carefully over his chest, pressing them hard against his shirt until his heart bumped against my palm, just like he had that last time, when I'd turned it into a goodbye. The tip of my fingers brushed softly against his bare chest and made it hard to breathe. I grasped his pulse, held it tight in my hand like I never wanted to let go.

"I guess we'll just have to make our own," he whispered, careful not to pollute the sound of our hearts. I shook my head and laughed at how cheesy that sounded.

“Too cheesy?” He guessed.

“No, Matt. Just right,” I was surprised when I meant it.

We started dancing to our own beats, Matt’s thrumming under my fingertips, mine loud in my ears, with only the stars as witnesses.


	2. A little less alone - Matt

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one goes out to bored_turtle, as a thank you for commenting and for managing to fit the word 'dream' in it.

It was hard to tell whose heart was beating faster. Karen’s pulse galloped into the night leaving a trail of questions I had no answer for. It was hard to ignore my own, as I usually did, when it was bumping so hungrily against her cold fingers. We swayed to the drumroll that was too upbeat to match our faltering steps, like words in a conversation we weren’t quite ready to have.

“What are you thinking about?” She asked quietly, her words slipping gently through the sparks that were popping louder than fireworks in the air between us.

I was thinking about the last time that I had kissed her, quick and sweet by the elevators. About how it had felt like it would have been one of many kisses to come. I was thinking about how if I had known that it would’ve been our last time, I would never have stopped. But I didn’t tell her that, not when I knew that she wouldn’t be able to feel my heart skip amidst the chaos in my chest.

“About something father Lantom said,” I murmured, “He said it was a miracle that I survived Midland Circle. I didn’t agree. Not then, at least.”

Now I was starting to see that maybe he’d been right. Except maybe the miracle wasn’t me. Maybe the miracle was just waiting for me, right here in the middle of the storm of grief that kept clawing at my lungs every time I tried to breathe.

“He was a wise man,” Karen conceded with a smile that made the wind whisper against her teeth.

I held tighter to my miracle and we danced some more, unhurried and gentle in the breeze.

“What are _you_ thinking of?” I asked when I needed her lips to do something other than tempt me.

She didn’t answer straight away, and I rode her pulse through a million terrifying guesses.

“Just. Life,” she shrugged, shoulders leaving ruby smears in the dark when they fell back.

“Yeah,” I said, like I knew what she was talking about. Except I had no idea.

I made her twirl again, a scalding tornado made of gold and crimson. I enjoyed the patterns she made against the night, my very own festival of lights. I enjoyed the simplicity of dancing, of moving our weight from one foot to the other like it could make it easier to bear.

She stepped closer when she was facing me once again and then slowly, tentatively, placed her head on my chest. I tried not to freeze as I felt her tense while she tried to gauge my response.

“K-karen?” I stammered, conscious of the way my heart was pounding, of how warm and perfect she felt cradled against me, of how fucking amazing she smelled.

“Just, turning up the volume,” she echoed me sheepishly and I huffed out a laugh while really all I could feel was her lips brushing lightly against my flesh as she spoke.

My arms tensed, released, and slowly, so slowly, rose through the air. It took a long time, longer than it should, like the air weighed more than all my mistakes, but eventually I let my hands rest in the small of her back, hoping it wasn’t too much, too soon, hoping it wouldn’t cause reality to come crashing down on us.

We were both still as we waited for the other to make a decision. How had each move become so difficult, so substantial, when we’d been lying this close, this alone, just a few short weeks ago? Her heat had been like a fire in that crypt and I’d let it warm me when everything had been just dark and cold. But now it was scorching, it was blissful and it was painful like I had become a lump of coal that was made to burn but had forgotten how.

I felt myself crumple with each second of her hesitation, the weight of her head seeping deeper and deeper into my chest. There had been so many blows, just so many. I'd become wrinkled like a ball of used tinfoil and I wasn't sure I could be straightened out again, not without the cracks and scratches that would show people exactly how to break me apart.

“Matt?” She moved away from my chest, replacing her weight with her hand, feeling my breath stagger out of my lungs with each throb of my pulse.

“Oh Matt,” she murmured more gently as she brushed my wet cheeks, erasing tears that I didn’t realise were there. It was like Midland Circle was crashing me all over again, like a damn had opened and spilled the waves of hurt from Maggie and Fisk and Nadeem and everything in between. Each slammed into me like a brick. I realised that I would never be able to seek advice in Father Lantom’s words. That he was gone, really gone, like Elektra, like my dad, like Stick.

And maybe it was the alcohol, maybe it was how safe Karen made me feel when she put her head on my chest, maybe it was how untidy my senses felt tonight, but I was crying like I hadn’t cried yet, through the numbness and the recovery and the fear. Tears chased each other down my cheeks, rocked by waves of grief and despair and I didn’t know how to make them stop.

I watched myself fall apart on this rooftop like I was somebody else, somebody who had the sense to keep it together in front of the pretty girl. I felt her hesitate and I didn’t blame her for wanting to run away from this mess. I didn’t deserve her. But instead she folded me into her arms, just like she had that one time in the office when the world had insisted to show me its worst side and I hadn’t found the strength to turn the other cheek.

The smell of tears got mixed with that of beer and whisky and her hair as she held me so tight, like she could see the cracks and wanted to make sure that she could keep me together. She didn’t say anything, and I was grateful, knowing how any words of comfort would be lies that would fade and fly away with the lightest breeze. Karen held me until her heat melted the cold lump in my throat and I could right the pillars that had fallen to the side. The wave of hurt passed like a tsunami and disappeared into a puddle, leaving me behind, a survivor amongst the debris.

“I’m sorry, K-karen, I,” I stumbled through the words, needing the noise to cover up the whoosh of air as it tripped in and out of my lungs.

“I’m right here Matt, I’m not going anywhere,” her voice cracked but her heartbeat was beautifully even, like I could believe her. She patted my back as she repeated, “Right here”, and ‘here’ became a location near my chest, warm and bright and beautiful.

She didn’t let me go, even after gravity came back and my lungs started to feel whole enough to hold each breath instead of shudder and break as air seeped from the holes. And eventually I found the strength to hold her tight like I had wanted to for so long, like I could shield her from the past and we could start again right here, right now.

She stepped back when I loosened my hold ever so slightly, using both hands to wipe away at my cheeks until they were dry and raw from the friction. I wasn’t sure where to go from here, from drunk, to spur-of-the-moment dancing on the roof, to completely losing my shit and sobbing like a child, all in the space of a few minutes. Karen was calm as she gently prised my glasses from my face and folded them neatly before placing them in my jacket pocket. She looked at my face for a long time. I wasn’t sure what answers she found in my eyes.

“Don’t look like that, Murdock. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve lost it in front of you,” her voice was light and kind, her fingers on my cheek like she was coaxing a smile. I think I managed a smirk that felt too fragile on my face, even to me. She sighed. It was a sad sound that told me all about the demons that were waiting for their turn to crush her.

“Want to talk about it?” She asked quietly, as if she knew the weight of the burden she was asking to share. I expected to say no, the words were on my tongue and half-way through my lips before I found myself nodding. Maybe I was tired, maybe I was drunk, maybe tonight just felt like a dream where everything was possible. Maybe I just knew that she could take it, that Karen was more resilient and fearless than the devil inside me.

“Come on,” she took my hand in hers and guided me steadily to the edge of the roof. She pulled me with her as she plopped herself down with her legs dangling over the edge. She didn’t let go of my hand, even after I was sitting next to her. I let the coldness of her fingers mix with the heat of my palms. It was soothing, like we could balance each other out.

“They look like stars, the lights,” she started when I didn’t, “and from up here you can somehow see both, like there’s stars everywhere.”

She was trying to make me see the magic of this rooftop, and it was sweet, how she wanted me to be part of her world. But I preferred to be lulled by the different colours in her voice, knowing that if I hadn’t been blind, I wouldn’t have spared this city one glance. No. Tonight, Karen would have been all I’d have looked at.

“I know it’s stupid, but when I’m up here, it feels like they are closer you know? Like they are watching us, all of them, Kevin, my mum, Ben, Father Lantom,” she started talking too quickly, like she did when she wasn’t sure she was saying the right thing and was hoping that you’d miss the mistake if she said it fast enough.

“It’s not stupid, Karen,” I told her, upset to find how dead my voice sounded. Still, I couldn’t help but look up and wonder what they would be thinking if they could see us now.

“I think they’d be happy,” Karen proclaimed, “they’d be happy to see us try to move on, to see us find joy again. They’d want to know that they didn’t die for nothing.”

Did they? Did Elektra? Did my dad? Would they be happy to find me like this? Would they be proud?

“I should’ve,” I started, feeling the weight of each loss in my hands like phantom heat left by a person that was no longer in the room.

“Yeh, me too,” she interrupted, “we should’ve done a lot of things. Not a day goes by that I don’t wake up and wish I could change just one little thing in my past. Who knows, maybe Kevin would still be alive. Maybe Ben. Maybe Father Lantom.”

She faltered and bit her lip. I could hear her teeth graze against the skin like physical hurt could replace another, deeper ache.

“Do you ever think about what our lives would be like, if they’d been here?”

If my dad had stayed down at that match, if I had forced Elektra to run away with me, if I had been there for Karen when she needed me the most.

She didn’t answer straight away. The wind rustled the tendrils of her hair like flames in the night, and I watched her face seek answers in the sky.

“I was a mess, the night Kevin died? I was a mess. I was high, and drunk and dating this jackass. I was speaking back to my dad, and shouting about my mum. I hated every corner of that town, every piece of my life. That day I got into this huge fight with Kevin because he had done the sweetest thing, trying to save me from myself. And then he was just dead, while I wasn’t even done shouting at him,” her voice trembled and she sucked in a deep lungful of air. I squeezed her fingers tighter.

“I’ll never be able to tell him how sorry I am. Never. No. But he is the reason I am here, right now. He is the reason I went looking for the life I was hoping for. And I met you, and Foggy, and it’s been crazy,” she snorted through her tears and paused to stifle a sob, but her smile was fiercer than any of her words.

“I just hope that they can know how grateful I am, you know? To all of them, really. Maybe this time it wasn’t about what we could’ve done to save them. Maybe this time it was about what _they_ did to save _us_.”

I considered her words for a moment, feeling grief morph into something lighter, a gift, a sacrifice. She turned to me, the tears on her face making her heat flicker like reflections in the water.

“Matt, I think we should stop dying with them. Stop killing ourselves with the what ifs and should’ve, would’ve, could’ve. And instead we should say ‘thank you’. Every time it hurts, every time we need them. We should tell them over and over and over again, until they hear us.”

She stood so quickly that I instinctively grabbed at her leg to stop her from falling to her death. She didn’t need me, and instead she dragged me to my feet and ran to the centre of the roof with me hot on her heels.

I felt her open her arms wide and lift them to the sky. The movement gave her the shape of an angel in the snow, just for a second. Then I heard her lungs fill to burst.

“Thank you!” she shouted, so loud that the sound echoed in the stars and the dogs started barking in the apartment downstairs.

“THANK YOU!” she screamed again, and her voice slammed like a fist against my eardrums.

“Come on, Matt,” she urged. I listened to the various tenants shuffle in their beds, to the animals whine in protest, to the neighbours that were looking outside the window for the noise that was interrupting their sleep.

 _Oh what the hell_ , I thought.

“THANK YOU,” I roared, louder than Karen, and she joined me as we screamed our grief to the sky, trying to outdo each other, trying to flit through the night and reach the heavens. We shouted until our voices got hoarse and the neighbours started throwing insults from the windows.

“Do you think they heard us?” she giggled, cheeks flushed and heart wild.

If God could hear our whispered prayers, could the dead hear our call?

The city filled with noise around us, cars blaring, dogs howling, men swearing, babies crying, feet shuffling in search of slippers, blankets rustling in beds, windows opening and closing, and Karen’s heart, loudest than all. And amidst all the confusion and the silence from the stars, I suddenly felt less alone.

“You know what? I think they did,” I told Karen. She let me hold her hand as we stared at the sky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it got a bit intense. But Matt is just so broken by the end of season 3. I didn't want him to be magically healed and whole again. I think Karen helped him a little. And now I can get on with the gooey bits.
> 
> Thanks for reading, really. :)


	3. Worth having around - Karen

I’d seen Matt as a lawyer. I’d seen Matt as Daredevil. But this Matt, the real Matt, he was mesmerizing.

His eyes were still rimmed with red from the tears, his cheeks still sporting the imprints from where my fingers had tried to dry them. He stared wide-eyed at the sky with his hair poking up at the side from where it had rubbed against my shoulder. He looked…innocent. Young. I could see boy Matt searching for his dad in the stars. All masks were finally, _finally_ off. And I couldn’t stop staring.

He turned to me eventually, offering me a full view of the perfect balance of sharp angles and soft curves that formed his face. His features folded themselves into a grin, a genuine earth-shatteringly beautiful grin that spread from his lips, to his eyes, to my bones. He was so beautiful it hurt. He was so beautiful, and he couldn’t be mine. I had given away my rights to this smile in front of a courtroom on a freezing sunlit morning. I’d told him he wasn’t a hero. I’d told him I was done. I never got the chance to tell him I’d been wrong.

“Shall we?” He asked.

“Hmmm?”

“Head home?” he clarified, angling his head. Was he trying to listen to my words or my heart?

“Um. Yes, sure,” I said casually. I hoped my heart was beating just as casually. The thought made me blush. If he noticed – of course he noticed, why did he have to notice everything – he didn’t comment.

I turned and headed, _casually_ , to the fire-escape, expecting him to follow. Instead, he planted his feet and his hand pulled me back.

“Don’t you want to go home?” His hand was just so warm.

“Yes,” he didn’t offer more than that, but didn’t move.

“Ok…?” His head was still cocked. He needed to stop listening to whatever he was listening to. I needed to stop blushing at the thought.

“I said I’d walk you home, Miss Page.”

“Yes…so walk me home?” I tried to turn again. He didn’t let me. A dangerous glint flickered in his eyes, so subtle that I would’ve missed it if I hadn’t been staring at him so greedily.

“My way,” and his whole face changed faster than it would have if he had just pulled on that Daredevil mask.

“You mean…?”

He couldn’t possibly mean to parkour our way home in a pencil skirt and heels? He couldn’t.

Matt grinned wider in response, a very excited look on his face. He could. He did. I gulped.

“I’ll keep you safe Karen.”

He almost seemed insulted that I would think otherwise. I gritted my teeth and tried to take a steadying breath. He waited for me to nod before he moved.

“Just do what I do,” he told me, turning me the opposite direction to where the fire escape lay, unused and ringing with ‘I told you so’s’ waiting to happen.

“Erm Matt,” I squeaked when I realised which way we were heading, “I don’t know about you, but I can’t fly.”

He laughed, free and playful. This was his favourite game. The sound of his laughter echoed deep in my belly and almost, _almost_ made the upcoming fall to my death worth it. I hoped that he took the jump in my pulse as an expression of fear rather than as a response to his arm wrapping itself securely around my back.

“Run and when I tell you, we jump.” Easy as one, two, three. I stopped feeling my legs.

“Ok, ready?” I tried to nod, but I was too busy fighting the urge to shake my head and ended up tilting it to the side.

“Run.”

My legs obeyed him when my mind couldn’t. We streaked past the roof, gaining speed as we approached the ledge. He kept an arm behind my back, wrapped the whole way around like he wanted to grab my elbow. I tightened my hold of his free hand.

“Jump!” He was half a second behind me, and never let me go. I squeezed my eyes shut and left my lungs behind as we flew, two comets in the night.

I landed hard on the next roof, but he didn’t let me fall, having twisted in mid-air to expertly bear most of my weight. I felt his arms flex to protect me, and his promise became blood and sinew.

Matt let me go and I stared at him in shock, trying to dislodge my gut from my throat. We couldn’t have jumped more than five or six feet. We couldn’t have been airborne longer than a few seconds. But the _rush_ of it.

“Good, huh?” He laughed as he read the adrenaline spike in my pulse. I grinned, breathless.

“Where to, Daredevil?” I wanted more. I wanted to fly again.

I found myself disappointed when he led the way to a set of adjoining roofs stretched out like a path in front of us. We started walking companionly side by side. Matt gallantly offered his hand every time I had to step onto or off a ledge. I took it, just because I could. My fingers tingled every time he let them go.

We stayed silent for a stretch. At least, silent to my ears. Matt was probably busy stealing a conversation from my body.

“Is this how it always is?” I asked him. It was so peaceful up here, so beautiful. It was like a different city. The darkness enveloped us gentle as a lullaby. I’d left my fear somewhere on the ground.

“Yes and no. Usually I…” he paused, hesitated.

“Run around beating bad guys?” I offered. His lips twitched with my heart.

“Usually I don’t take the time to enjoy it,” he finished simply. He kept his eyes low, his head turned straight ahead, and I tried not to hope that he’d meant it as a compliment.

And to think that this view could have been part of my world for so long now. If only…

“Why didn’t you tell me Matt? Before?” I blurted out. He flinched a little and I experience a flash of satisfaction, because even after all this time, after all that had happened, his lies still hurt. But it was just a moment, brief as a lightning bolt in a storm, and then all that was left was sadness.

“I wanted to tell you Karen, I really did. But then,” he turned away from me, his hand slipping this way and that as if to gather the words from the dark, “you used to look at me like I was _good_. At the beginning, before we even started, there was something in the way you responded to me, I... It made me want to _be_ good, you know? It made me want to be the man that could live up to the idea that you had of me.”

I thought back to all those stolen glances in the initial days, so much less daring than they would’ve been because I was so sure he was blind. My voice had stuttered every time he’d addressed me. My pulse had spiked every time he’d come near me. He’d seen all of it. He’d known all along. It was humiliating, like finding out your crush had read your journal. And even thought I had known for such a long time now, I couldn’t seem to rub away the sting from the truth.

He seemed to feel my anger and stopped walking to face me, grabbing my wrist to still me, then stepped back when I tried to yank it free. He lifted both palms defensively and took a slow step forward.

“It was more than that Karen, more than a selfish will to preserve an image you had in your head. I was afraid I would lose you once you found out how not good I was. Once you saw all the lies. I mean, Foggy is my best friend, and I almost lost him over this,” his mouth turned into a grimace and I saw the pain in his eyes, “I’m still not really sure I haven’t lost him after all this time.”

 _Everyone in Matthew's life abandoned him,_ had warned Maggie. And we had too, each one of us, we’d failed Matt like a row of dominoes stacked to fall.

“I couldn’t lose you Karen, not you,” he ran a hand through his hair, leaving a few more strands standing up, “and then of course I managed to lose you all by myself, without even telling you the truth.”

He laughed a laugh that was without joy, like someone had recorded the sound of happiness and turned it upside down. My anger turned to guilt, a slow dull ache, embers after a fire. I watched Matt slide away, shutters slamming closed in his wide, beautiful eyes.

“It wasn’t, I wasn’t…” my words snatched like fingers in the air between us, fumbling to find the clasp that was closing Matt away from me, “I promised you I’d be there, Matt. When you were ready to tell me, I promised you I would be there. And I wasn’t. Not really. I didn’t even want to listen, and then when I did, I just walked away.”

I saw something flicker in his eyes, like a handle, a keyhole, an opportunity to open the door again. I fought the urge to place my hand over it and pry him open.

“You were hurt, it was understandable, you trusted me, and I was your friend and I betrayed your trust-”

“Matt,” I interrupted, “we’ve told you how annoying it is to argue with you when you keep agreeing with us.”

“Sorry,” his smile was sheepish, and I absorbed it like I was stealing a glimpse from a window. He was warm and true and perfect, and he was right there.

“I’m sorry it took me so long to come back,” I whispered as I reached for his hand. I knew he’d opened the door again when his fingers twisted through mine.

“Me too,” he murmured, and I was sad when I realised that we weren’t back at all, not in any way that counted. Sure, we were Nelson and Murdock and Page, sure, we were friends, or trying to be. But his lips would remain far away, as forbidden as if they belonged to another man. And maybe they did. Maybe I had kissed a stranger in that perfect night. I wondered if I’d ever be able to just see raindrops in the smell rain. I wondered if I’d ever be able to swallow Indian food again when that blend of spices just tasted of his lips.

“As for the ‘good’ thing,” I told him earnestly, quotation marks heavily implied in my tone, “you only became better when you told me the truth.”

He shifted and tried to turn away. I knew he’d fight me on this, I knew he’d disagree. I moved my free hand to his face and tried to anchor him to my words. His pulse flickered gently against my pinkie.

“Foggy and I, we never hated Daredevil because we thought he was bad. I don’t think we ever hated Daredevil at all. I think we struggled to accept Daredevil because we couldn’t accept the fact that it meant that you would get hurt.”

“I can take care of myself,” he started.

“And so can I! So can Foggy!” I thundered, shutting him up, “but that doesn’t mean that we won’t get hurt. It doesn’t mean that we wouldn’t worry that one day we could lose you.”

Midland Circle collapsed all over again and I felt the weight of the building crush me like the emptiness of a doorway at a precinct. I’d watched every news report available that night, replayed it a thousand times, searched until I could find the footage from every angle. I’d let the dust shape itself into shadows of a horned devil, like it could fill the door that Matt never came through. Because he had to be alive. Our last conversation couldn’t have been one that had me dripping in disappointment at the fact that Matt had chosen to embrace every part of himself.

“When we lost you,” Matt sucked in a sharp breath like he had been punched, “when we thought we’d lost you,” I amended to ease the blow, “it was like our worst fears had come true. Those few months Matt, I,” I skidded to a halt again when his eyes filled with puppy-dog guilt.

There were no words for the nights that I had cried myself to sleep, for the hours that I had spent pouring over fruitless research, for the articles on the ‘real Daredevil’ that I had written. He’d become an obsession I couldn’t shake like that nagging hint of hope that made my grief sharper. The silence of Matt’s empty apartment still rang like a tomb in my nightmares.

When I spoke again it was calm and calculated. I fired each word with a precision that would have made Frank Castle proud.

“When we thought we’d lost you, we realised that we wouldn’t have cared if you dressed up in a mankini and paraded around town asking for spare change,” his eyebrows shot to the sky, “because you are probably the best thing in our lives.”

Without the ‘probably’. But I shoved it in there like an extra coating of paint, like a shield. I paused, noting that my voice had reached an octave that was close to his eyebrows.

His mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water. I continued before he found the words to dismiss mine.

“We realised it was never about the hero you turned into when you put on that stupid costume,” more like sexy as hell, but he didn’t need to know that.

“I’m not a-”

“It was never about the hero you turned into when you put on that costume,” I repeated more loudly, “It’s about the hero you already are to us as Matt Murdock.”

I took a slow step forward and placed a hand on the side of his face, coasting my fingers gently through his hair on my way to his jaw. Matt seemed to gravitate closer without meaning to, his head tilted to listen or to…?

“Karen,” he breathed, and I could taste him on my lips. My pulse started screaming in my ears, each beat propelling me forward, like my heart wanted to unpeel itself from my chest and land next to his. I could hear the whoosh of air as it filled and emptied his lungs, or maybe it was mine. I was trapped in the middle of a hurricane, unsure which air belonged to whom. I realised I didn’t care.

He tensed, hesitated. I let my voice break through the tissue paper walls that we had built between us, filled with excuses and consequences that kept the nightmares away. Except the fairy tales hid somewhere beside them too, just out of reach.

“You are worth having around, Matt.”

And so much more than that. I let my fingers breathe the truth into his skin with gentle, hesitant strokes against the sandpaper stubble of his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still here? I wish I could give you kudos.
> 
> Thanks for reading! <3


	4. For no reason at all - Matt

_You are worth having around, Matt._

Last time I’d heard these words, she’d been inches away from my face, locked between my heart and my brain. She’d promised me she’d be there. She’d been the sound that brought me back to life.

_You are worth having around, Matt._

I remembered the way she’d smelled that day, like adrenaline and fear and courage and summer, all caked-in with the myriads of scents that made Hell’s Kitchen. She’d had her hair up too, something similar to tonight. As if those metal clasps could contain the waterfall that normally rippled down past her shoulders. I could hear loose strands waving in the wind, rebelling against the dam that wanted to imprison them.

_You are worth having around, Matt._

It’s like we were playing a game of truth or dare, with secrets spilling out of our mouths faster than leaking faucets until my muscles were almost aching for a dare. I wanted to turn away before more words could stumble their way onto my tongue.

_You are worth having around, Matt._

I swirled her words around in my mind, lost in her smell and her heat and I don’t know what made me do it. It’s as if I couldn’t help it. My fingers reached out to the back of her head and pulled at the metal that I could taste twisted in between her locks. Her hair fell like warm water on my hand, with a sound that was softer than a wave sweeping the shore. I let it flow between my fingers like rays of sunshine between leaves; I made it skim whisper-light against the back of my hand.

Karen’s hand was still pulsing against the side of my face, teasing each nerve-ending with sparks and heat. I listened to the song of her lungs as they opened and closed like there wasn’t enough air. We’d already said so much, so much more than ever before. It was almost selfish of me to break the silence. But how could I not when I already missed the sound of her voice.

“It’s. Ah. It’s blonde, isn’t it?” Foggy had told me it was, back in the days when Karen was ‘his’.

“Yeah,” Karen’s tone reminded me of words carefully chosen when lips were best used for purposes other than talking, “can you tell?”

“Dark hair absorbs heat differently.”

Karen’s hair reflected the light like it was made of gold. It made me want to walk outside just to see the sun lose the battle of who could shine brightest.

“Matt, do you know what I look like?” Her heart was the drumroll to this conversation.

“I have a picture of you in my head.”

It wasn’t made of colours and shapes. It was a canvas where the paintbrush had been lost and sounds and smells now seeped from the woven fabric. I knew the noise that her eyelashes made when they streaked through the air, the secret in those smiles when her lips scrunched up but left her teeth shielded, how her hair sounded like water lapping lazily against the sides of a pool when she was nervous. I knew the exact moment her lungs would freeze when she was scared, the salty-sweet scent of her tears, how her heart raced when she fought. I knew how soft her skin was from the murmur of her dresses as they swiped her legs, the million tones that made her voice ring like a tune. I knew the way her pulse would hitch in the moment right before I kissed her, only to spill back into her veins as she pressed her lips to mine. I had that rhythm memorised like lyrics to my favourite song.

“Foggy said that you, um, feel people’s face to get an accurate picture of them.”

Her hand was wrestling between strokes and taps on my cheek like it was having an entirely different conversation.

“Sometimes,” I conceded, unsure.

“You’ve never done that to me.”

Did she want me to? My fingers twitched in her hair at the thought.

“It was never…” I faltered again, “it was never appropriate, I guess.”

We’d known each other for so long that it felt like a lifetime. And still our relationship had moved like we’d been rushing between chapters in a book. I felt like I was desperately reading the words as the wind rustled the pages, never reaching an end, only glimpses of beginnings.

“Oh,” she paused, and the sound of her lips smacking closed made me momentarily lose my train of thought. Her hand did a nervous tap, tap, tap thing against my jaw that was almost as loud as her heart.

“You could, um, you could do it now, if you were curious?”

I couldn’t read the lie in between the beats when her heart refused to pause. Her pulse rushed along with mine like there wasn’t enough space. I knew she could feel it against her fingertips. I was suddenly so nervous that my mouth went dry.

I heard Karen’s eyes close like a head on a pillow, her eyelashes fondling the skin beneath her eyes in a way that made me jealous. Her tongue darted out to wet her lips before she nervously settled her features into what I could only assume was the most neutral expression based on how the breeze was unable to burrow in between the creases of her skin.

It was greedy. I didn’t need to. I’d held her face before. I knew her so well I could pick her out in a crowd. I didn’t need to. Yet my hand was half-way there before I’d made the conscious decision to move it.

I couldn’t do it. I shouldn’t do it. The distance between us stretched onwards like an abyss, like a rule and my hand locked in mid-air like a half-hearted salute.

Karen was brave, braver than me and she didn’t hesitate except for the trembling in her hands as she took my fingers and placed them carefully on the top of her forehead, right where I’d kissed her oh-so-many times. It was warm and soft and only hers, like she had erased the imprints of my love from her skin. She let her hands fall to her side like a permission slip for playing hooky that I clutched, unable to believe that it was really there.

And there I was, the man without fear, petrified at the thought of making her mine. But my fingers knew the way and they started wandering like they were coming home.

Her skin alternated from silky tautness to little pools of softness that I wanted to sink into like a bath. Her eyebrows intrigued me like a well-written poem and I moved my other hand to join the expedition so that I could capture each verse. I had always been better at reading with two hands.

I was careful not to press onto her eyelids as I let her eyelashes rustle and paint my skin.

“They, uh…they are blue,” Karen murmured helpfully. _As blue as a summer’s sky_ , Foggy had said. The canvas took on new shapes as colours started leaking onto it, gold and ruby for the sound of her voice, blues and greens for the feel of her skin.

I used one hand to draw the shape of her nose, finding her small nostrils like a treasure. The pads of my index fingers luxuriated in the lushness of her cheeks, so much so that I struggled to move on. When I did, her breathing changed from smooth to carefully controlled. I could hear her diaphragm contract, careful to prevent the air from divulging any of her thoughts.

I took my time to sweep her hair aside to explore the contours of her jaw, cradling her face in both my palms. Karen shivered when my pinkies grazed against her neck.

I reached her chin like the peak of a mountain, my breaths coming in huffs as if from the exertion. Her lips parted slightly like they were signalling the finish line and I stilled, wishing I could have run slower, wishing I could start the race again.

Her mouth called to me like a missing puzzle piece, one that I had to discover if I wanted to finish my painting. Those lips I knew so well now felt foreign, like the secrets and truths had changed their shape. My legs took a step forward, until it felt like Karen’s body, Karen’s air, was overflowing and spilling into me.

My thumb was only shaking slightly as it climbed to rest on her bottom lip. It made her mouth open slightly, so that her jumbled breath hummed against the back of my hand. Her tongue was still and waiting in the heat of her mouth. My hands froze like discarded tools and I felt myself inch forward. Karen stopped breathing.

_You are not going to kiss me, Matt._

There were a million different reasons why I shouldn't. A million, all laid out like stars, some bigger, some smaller, some brighter, some duller. All there. They chased each other in the night in a blur of colour and sound and memories, like a solid force pressing me back. It was a chaos of guilt and temptation, want and hesitation and I don’t know how long I spent lost in the space in between. All I know is that I swallowed some and fought some others and some would forever leave scars like blades. But when I finally, FINALLY kissed her, it was for no reason at all. It was nonsensical and logical, like gravity and air. I wanted to, I needed to, I had to. And so I did.

My lips replaced my thumb, parting slightly only to cage her bottom lip in that instant right before her lungs could turn her inhale into an exhale. The only breath became that breeze that suddenly struggled to find a way between us and we stood, frozen in a heartbeat.

It was quick, like a brush of an angel’s wing as it flew towards heaven. But it was also long and slow and gentle enough to bruise. My lips found hers like I was tasting a sip of wine, one that I knew so well but haven't had in a while, one that I had forgotten I liked so much. Cherry, smoke-wood and chocolate left imprints on my skin and the heady smell of alcohol only fuelled my need like fire.

I kissed her for a moment, just one moment that felt like a second and a forever. I kissed her swift as a thief deftly stealing something precious. I was gone before she could be sure I was ever there at all.

I'm not sure she'll ever understand what I took with that kiss. I vowed to keep it hidden in that chest where I locked memories like gemstones, buried deep beneath the secrets of a devil’s armour and the symbol of my dad’s victory, placed carefully next to the taste of rain and a perfect night, accessible only in that second between dreams and reality.

I took a step back to steady myself, feeling the world greet my palms with a smack, cold and hard after the closeness of her face, while my lips smarmed like they’d been burned. Karen seemed to wake like from a dream, a statue coming to life. She licked her lips like she wanted to test reality and a hand rose to her cheek in wonder. It was an eternity before she spoke and when she did, her lips teased me as they moved but her voice betrayed nothing, leaving me wondering if it had all been a dream.

“So…uh…What do I look like?”

I thought about it, about my canvas and its fibres and the moments in between. Karen had always been too good for me.

“Like a summer’s sky.”

Her cheeks blushed like a sunrise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know about you, but I've always wanted Matt to feel Karen's face, ever since the first few episodes.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed it now that he finally did. Even if he couldn't complete the picture with his hands alone. I did promise you fluff!
> 
> Readers, you make my day. Thank you. <3

**Author's Note:**

> Mmmmmm...I think this should be continued. And perhaps it's time to give Matt a turn to speak..what do you think?
> 
> Thanks for reading.


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